William Douglas's Blog (628)

There is a bit of a spat between Wikipedians over the introduction of Douglas into the Hamilton name.

Who was the first Douglas-Hamilton?  And which Duke was the first to use the double barrelled name?

To see what is going on behind the scenes, one must look at the 'View history' and talk pages.  You can see who is editing the article, and look at their talk pages.

The earliest date that I can find for a Douglas-Hamilton is 1874. Does anyone know better?

Contessa della Rena was the wife of a Florentine wine merchant, who became mistress of various members of the English aristocracy. By 1759 she was in England under the protection of William Douglas, Earl of March, a notorious rake whose main interests were horse-racing, dancing girls and opera. In the last of these, March and his mistress would have come into contact with Giardini, whose forays into production of the Italian opera [was noted previously].

La Rena sat to…

The kirkyards website is a resource containing a variety of information to assist people researching their family trees where their ancestors came from the Stewartry (or County) of Kirkcudbright, or the local history of the county, as it existed prior to 1975 when county boundaries were removed and it became part of Dumfries and Galloway.

All inscriptions on gravestones in the following parishes were transcribed and the…

I was asked recently if I knew the origins of the Inglis family right to wear the Douglas Hunting tartan.  of course, I don't!

The Inglis are a sept of the Douglases, and I presume different septs have the right to wear different Douglas tartans.…

Jean Douglas, styled Lady Glenbucket, as being the widow of the late Gordon of Glenbucket, had been endowed by her husband, in terms of her marriage contract with a thousand pounds Scots of free rent out of the best of his lands ‘nearest adjacent to the house.’ At his death in 1693, she entered on the possession of the mains and house of Glenbucket, and uplifted some of the rents, out of which she did aliment her eight children till May [1696],' when an…

AddressingHistory is asking history enthusiasts to explore their ancestors and local historical connections by finding and placing historical Scottish Post Office Directory listings on the map. 

 

Funded by JISC, the AddressingHistory website combines the listings from the Directories, historical forerunners of Yellow Pages, with maps…

Howard Mathieson has created a free Google Earth app entitled GeoGenealogy's Gazetteer of Scotland, in effect a Gazetteer of Gazetteers it has the following features:

Scalable boundary files of the counties(32) and the parishes(891) of Scotland

Each county has links to Genuki, The Family search WIKI ,  …

We are looking for help in identifying the person in this photograph.  Can you help?

Photo reads, "Compliments of G. W. Douglas taken on his 74th birth day March 30, 1895"



Photo taken by Ruescher at 362 & 364 Fulton St.,…

On 12th October 1693, John Skudamore , David Douglas and John Gowen , were indicted for a Misdemeanor, in erecting and setting up a private Printing-press, and printing therewith, or causing to be printed several Scandalous and Seditious Pamphlets against the Peace of the King and Queen, and Government, and for privately and secretly dispersing the said Scandalous Pamphlets .

The King's Messenger swore that the Press was found in …

Jeff and Justine Douglas outside their flood damaged home

Regions of Queensland have begun re-emerging from the floodwaters, as Brisbane started a mass clean-up following the deluge that has swamped thousands of homes over the past few days.

As the water receded, putrid mud and debris was left covering…

1. United Kingdom  

2. United States 

3. Australia  

4. Canada  

5. Germany 

The Hungarians spent more time on the site than any other nationality. Most visited pages were the general information pages, eg lists of battles.…

We have known for sometime that Elizabeth, daughter of John Douglas of Newcastle married William Douglas, 12th Laird of Cavers (d1698).  However, who is this John Douglas?

Today, I came across this reference:

We possess an unrecorded chapter in connexion with the water supply of old Newcastle. Before the arrangement between William Grey, author of the ^^Chorographia," and the Corporation in 1647, there can be no doubt that the Newcastle people drew their main…

A researcher has sent me the following:

The Earl of Morton had several Arctic interests, as far as I can see. He and Alexander Bruce Hugh, 6th Lord Balfour of Burleigh had major shares in the little known Spitzbergen Coal and Mineral Ltd of London before Morton became involved in the Spitzbergen Mining and Exploration Syndicate in 1906. His third son, Archibald Roderick Sholto, was also a shareholder in the latter. Then there were shares in Arctic Ltd, but I have no idea what that…